Michaela Eichwald
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis
November 14, 2020 – May 16, 2021
MICHAELA EICHWALD
Hermetic Order of the Golden Privation, 2016
Acrylic, graphite, oil crayon, varnish and tempera on pleather
51-3/16 x 41-5/16 in.
Private Collection, Berlin
MICHAELA EICHWALD
Steinzeit, 2015
Acrylic, oil, lacquer, and graphite on pleather
53 1/2 x 93 1/4 in / 136 x 237 cm
Private Collection, Minneapolis
Berlin-based artist and writer MICHAELA EICHWALD (Germany, b. 1967) maintains a restless and fearless belief in the possibility of painting. Bringing together pieces made over the last 15 years, this first US museum exhibition reveals the wide variety of references in her work, drawing on references to theology, philosophy, and art history, while also reflecting on her own life: her surroundings, thinking, reading, and friends.
Following studies in philosophy, history, art history, and German philology in Cologne, Michaela Eichwald emerged as an artist, with her first exhibition held at Galerie Daniel Buchholz in 1997. The context of Cologne—at the time, an undisputed center of European contemporary art—proved formative for Michaela Eichwald, a place where she maintained a lively exchange of ideas with many intellectuals and fellow artists, including Kai Althoff, Jutta Koether, Michael Krebber, Josef Strau, and Charline von Heyl, among others. In 2006, Michaela Eichwald began episodically blogging on uhutrust.com, providing a logbook with insight into her practice, everyday musings, and contemplations of current affairs.
MICHAELA EICHWALD
Die Neuen Bestimmungen Sind Da, 2013
Oil on canvas
27 x 73 in.
Private collection, Minneapolis
MICHAELA EICHWALD
Die Unsrigen sind fortgezogen, 2014
Acrylic, spray paint, lacquer and ball paint on pleather
330 x 138 cm / 130 x 54.3 in
Private Collection, Minneapolis
Bridging abstraction and figuration, Michaela Eichwald’s densely layered paintings—often made on unconventional surfaces such as printed canvas or imitation leather—bear an alchemical combination of acrylic, oil, tempera, spray paint, mordant, graphite, varnish, and lacquer. Whether in large- or small-scale formats, her works combine smooth paint strokes and quick smudges, at times revealing figurative forms and snippets of text. Discussing her preference for pleather, the artist notes, “artificial leather has something repulsive, inelegant, something that cannot be easily classified in art history.” This sense of refusing to fall within conventions underscores Michaela Eichwald’s practice. While her works are part of a lineage of abstraction, they resist any direct connection to a particular movement or period, instead churning through a history of painterly styles and combining them in surprising ways.
MICHAELA EICHWALD
Bulli, 2009
Mixed media in epoxy resin on plinth
10.5 x 7 x 9 cm | 4 1/4 x 2 3/4 x 3 1/
Private Collection, New York
MICHAELA EICHWALD
1. Preis, 2008
Resin, glass, plastic and steel
18.5 x 9.5 x 9.5 cm
7 1/4 x 3 3/4 x 3 3/4 inches
To create her sculptures, Michaela Eichwald pours resin into bags, rubber gloves, and plastic bottles, in which she collects—like objects captured in amber—uncommon and dissonant materials, such as chicken bones, erasers, jewelry, mushrooms, fishing tackle, needles, candy, small drawings, and hard-boiled eggs. At once repulsive and alluring, grotesque and seductive, these pieces bring to mind associations ranging from trophies and time capsules to the human digestive system.
Interspersed throughout the exhibition is a newly commissioned long-form poem by her friend, writer Ulf Stolterfoht, created especially in response to the selection of works on view.
Curator: Pavel Pyś, curator, Visual Arts
WALKER ART CENTER
725 Vineland Place, Minneapolis, MN 55403
